Top 20 Biggest Video Game Copycat FAILS
#20: “The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner” (1987)
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In 1985, Sega released a killer arcade title called “Space Harrier.” It was widely touted within the industry for its incredible graphics and fun jet-propulsion-based gameplay, and it was subsequently ported over to dozens of home consoles. By all accounts, it was a monumental success. And in came “The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner” to leech off it. This one came from Square and was released for the NES. The game was a technical marvel, being one of the first to utilize stereoscopic 3D and a forward-based scrolling effect that allowed players to move in any direction. Technical marvel aside, it was an obvious ripoff of Sega’s game and its innovative technology.
#19: “Pac-Man Party” (2010)
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Someone should have told Namco Bandai that they were about ten years too late to get aboard the “party” bus. In 1999, Hudson Soft and Nintendo released the brilliant “Mario Party.” The multiplayer gameplay was highly praised, and it became the go-to sleepover game. The series is still going strong today, with “Super Mario Party” being released in 2018. In 2010, Namco Bandai ripped the formula right off for “Pac-Man Party.” They weren’t even inventive enough to give it its own title! Making it worse is Namco Bandai’s obvious inferiority to Nintendo, resulting in an inferior game no matter which way you slice it.
#18: “Quantum Theory” (2010)
In 2006, Cliff Bleszinski and Epic Games gave us “Gears of War,” which proved to be one of the next-gen “Halo” killers. It proudly sat alongside “Halo” and “Call of Duty” as the go-to multiplayer games of the generation, with particular attention going to its graphics and cover-based shooting mechanics. Nearly five years later, Team Tachyon released “Quantum Theory.” Just a single glance at its artwork is enough to give away its obvious inspiration. Like “Gears,” the characters are muscular and wear large, bulky pieces of armor. The guns and camera angles are virtually identical, as is the game’s cover-based shooting mechanics. They’re so similar we’re surprised Epic didn’t slap them with a lawsuit.
#17: “The Legend of Zeldo: Lonk’s Awakening” (2015)
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This is probably not the ripoff you were expecting. “Flappy Bird” was the world’s biggest mobile game in January of 2014, becoming the most-downloaded free app on the App Store. However, the Flappy Bird wasn’t long for this world, and he was put down by his creator on February 10, 2014. Naturally, a ton of clones and ripoffs sprouted up in its wake to fill the gap and satiate the addictions of players everywhere. “The Legend of Zeldo: Lonk’s Awakening” was one of these games, as it was essentially just “Flappy Bird” with a Zelda themed coat of paint.
#16: “BoxMaker” (2017)
This game is just a mess on all accounts. Nintendo released “Super Mario Maker” in 2015, an interesting side scroller that let players create their own Mario courses. A couple years later, we got the glorious “BoxMaker.” “BoxMaker”all but admits that it ripped off “Super Mario Maker” in its grammatical abomination of a Steam description. It’s not just the concept that the developers ripped off - the music, the sound effects, the color scheme, the gameplay mechanics - everything is ripped straight from Mario.
#15: “Legend of Crouching Dragon” (2013)
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Blizzard isn’t one to take things lying down. Not long after “Hearthstone” was released in closed beta, a Chinese developer swooped in and ripped off the concept. Even the logo was strikingly similar. “Legend of Crouching Dragon: Generals of the Three Kingdoms” was released the following fall season on mobile devices, and Blizzard was not happy. They launched a copyright violation lawsuit, resulting in “Legend of Crouching Dragon” being taken off the App Store and its servers being temporarily suspended. In 2014, Blizzard won the lawsuit, and developer Unico Interactive was reportedly asked to hand over $1.6 million in compensation.
#14: “Kung Fu Panda: Showdown of Legendary Legends” (2015)
Fighting games are tricky to pull off, as titles like “Street Fighter,” “Mortal Kombat,” and “Super Smash Bros.” pretty much nailed the formula. It seems hard to make an original fighting game these days, and as such, new ones are often compared to the classics. But “Kung Fu Panda” is essentially a one-to-one remake of “Super Smash Bros.” The gameplay and look are identical, complete with increasing percentage points as a damage counter, a drop-in from above after elimination, crowd noises, orchestral music, and even that colorful explosion graphic that accompanies a knockout. If Po was in “Super Smash,” you literally couldn’t tell the difference.
#13: “Final Combat” (2011)
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And here we have another blatant Chinese ripoff. Like “Kung Fu Panda,” “Final Combat” is a one-to-one ripoff of “Team Fortress 2,” only without the quality. The character classes are exactly the same, although they lack the charm and sense of humor of the original cast. The game also copies numerous elements from “Team Fortress,” including gameplay mechanics and the colorful, cartoony art style. It could make for a decent, albeit blatant, ripoff if it weren’t for the horrible controls, persistent bugs, and rampant framerate issues. It’s just a bad game all around.
#12: “Disney Infinity” series (2013-15)
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The toys-to-life genre exploded when the “Skylanders” franchise released in 2011. While some games, like “Lego Dimensions”, have managed to set themselves apart, “Disney Infinity” practically replicated the formula. Level up your favorite Disney character, buy Power Discs for more weapons and improved stats, and beat up the bad guys. You could even design your own levels, a feature which would evolve in 2.0 and 3.0. However, there just wasn’t enough content, and buying a new version every year quickly became expensive. By the time the series had reached its true potential, players had left. Eventually, Disney called it quits, and promptly shut down developer Avalanche Software and it’s publishing division.
#11: “Another Bound Neo” (2008)
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The GameCube didn’t have much, but it did have “Metroid Prime,” AKA perhaps the greatest first person shooter of all time. “Metroid Prime” influenced untold amounts of developers and video games, and it’s certainly not rare to see elements of it in various other first person shooter and adventure games. But “Another Bound Neo” is a straight ripoff. It looks exactly the same, and the screen layout alone could fool anyone not deeply familiar with “Metroid Prime.” Put screenshots next to each other, and “Another Bound Neo” might just pass the taste test. Or sight test, in this case.
#10: “The Great Giana Sisters” (1987)
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Copycat games have been an issue long before mobile gaming was plagued with them. As the oldest entry on this list, “The Great Giana Sisters” was a shameless clone of “Super Mario Bros.” Just look at this! It's as if the art style was directly lifted from “Super Mario Bros.”, and the developers made tiny tweaks to look slightly different! While it's believed that Nintendo filed a lawsuit against the developers, that rumor has since been proven false. However, Nintendo did take part in swaying sales away from “Giana Sisters”.
#9: “Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta” (2013)
It’s hard to imagine anyone trying to replicate the look and feel of the “Uncharted” series. Considering the game’s size and scope, it’d be hard to pull off. And yet, someone still tried to copy it. What resulted was “Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta”, a game tried so hard to look exactly like “Uncharted”, the main character looks like he could Nathan Drake’s cousin. The most notable flaw here is in the incredibly awkward animations, everyone looks stiff as a board! The reviews on Metacritic aren’t lying…
#8: “The Simpsons: Skateboarding” (2002)
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“The Simpsons” have had some pretty good copycat games over the years, with a few games successfully setting themselves apart from the games that inspired them. However, not every title was a real shiner. Enter “The Simpsons: Skateboarding”, a “Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater” clone that forgot to include everything that made the games fun. Why can’t I pull off this trick? Why am I not able to grind on that railing? Why is it so frustrating to control?? The game was buggy, the physics were broken, and it failed to replicate the fluidity “Pro Skater” was known for.
#7: “Sonic Shuffle” (2000)
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“Mario Party” has been known for its simple, yet replayable gameplay. You hit a Dice Block, navigate your way to a Star, and play a bunch of minigames. Few have tried to replicate this formula, and very few have succeeded. “Sonic Shuffle” did not succeed. The game was essentially “Mario Party” with a Sonic skin, but its gameplay was just too confusing. You draw a random card from your hand to move, but you can also steal an opponent’s card? …What? And ohhhhhh, the load times! You spend more time waiting on the game to load than playing it! This game was just another case of Sonic trying to be like Mario.
#6: “Fur Fun” (aka “Kewpie-Jazzy”) (2017)
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These days, it’s not rare to see a game billed as a “spiritual successor” end up being a poor imitation. “Fur Fun” was a Steam game that desperately tried jumping on the “Yooka-Laylee” hype train in early 2017. Like other abusive Steam developers, “Fur Fun” was littered with stolen assets, using gold ingots from “Minecraft” and ripping music straight out of “Banjo-Kazooie”. Oh, and did we mention a YouTuber published this? Yep! DalasReview not only published the game, but he also provided some of the worst narration we’ve ever heard. On top of that, he went out of his way to file DMCA takedowns and hide any negative criticism. “Fur” shame!
#5: “CastleMiner” (2011)
Mojang Studios’s “Minecraft” is the game of our generation, and with over 200 million copies sold, it is the highest-selling video game of all time. There was bound to be a few ripoffs. Perhaps the worst of all was DigitalDNA’s “CastleMiner.” This too is a block-building sandbox game centered around mining for materials and building structures. It was just one of many “Minecraft” ripoffs released through Xbox Live Indie Games, and while it was arguably the worst, it was also the most successful, selling over one million units. It just goes to show that sometimes shamelessly ripping off something else does pay off.
#4: “Mole Kart” (2012)
Once again we have a shameless Chinese knockoff in the form of “Mole Kart.” Released for iOS in 2012, “Mole Kart” is exactly what it sounds like. Comparisons to “Mario Kart” were obvious and instantly made by critics and fans alike, with nearly every review in the App Store mentioning its obvious inspiration by name. In fact, entire courses were ported over, including Moo Moo Meadows and Mushroom Gorge, and the items, blocks, and sound effects were nearly identical. It didn’t take long for Nintendo to take notice, and the game was quickly taken off the App Store. However, it was later re-released under the title “Mole Kart I,” and a sequel was released the following September.
#3: “Cartoon Network: Punch-Time Explosion” (2011)
There are SO MANY games trying to copy the success of “Super Smash Bros”. What most of them fail to realize is that you need a strong character roster, good level design, and a balanced game. “Punch-Time Explosion” had a pretty decent character roster, like Dexter, Billy & Mandy, Nigel Uno, Samurai Jack, and the Powerpuff Girls. However, some of these characters were too overpowered, and most of them played too much like their “Smash Bros” counterparts. The game even had its own version of Subspace Emissary from “Brawl”! “Punch-Time Explosion” had the potential to be a great Cartoon Network branded game, but it turned out to be yet another “Smash Bros” clone.
#2: “Infinite Crisis” (2015)
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MOBAs are all the rage these days, but the market has become so saturated that there’s almost no room for a new game. Unfortunately, Warner Bros. Interactive and developer Turbine realized this a little too late. “Infinite Crisis” has you playing as your favorite DC character trying to destroy the enemy team’s base. It was a decent game, but the problem is that we already have “League of Legends”, “Dota 2”, and “Smite”. With all three having established communities, you’d have a hard time trying to get players to switch over. The game soon found itself in a crisis of its own, and servers were shutdown less than five months after release.
#1: “The War Z” (aka “Infestation: Survivor Stories”) (2012)
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If you want to understand the definition of “shameless”, this game perfectly encapsulates the meaning. “The War Z” was one of many games that tried riding the coattails of “Day Z” during the peak of its success. In fact, “War Z” went so far to replicate the game that it looked like an exact copy! Problems quickly escalated when the developers were caught lying about features within their game, and they would incorporate microtransactions later down the road. Add in homophobic slurs from the executive producer and censoring criticism, and “War Z” would go down as one of the worst games ever made.
